The
first variation refers to the length of the thread. The thread itself,
fixed at the needle's eye, varied between 3 feet and 6 inches in
length. Other changes refer to the voluntary speed, to the number of
stitches, to fatigue, to external stimuli, to attention, to methods of
training, and so on, but the chief interest remains centred on the
psychical factors. We are still too much at the beginning already to
foresee whether it will be possible to draw from these psychophysical
experiments helpful conclusions. The four young women engaged in this
laboratory research will later extend it to the psychological
conditions of work with the various types of sewing-machines.
XV
THE ECONOMY OF MOVEMENT
The study of the technical aspect of labor can nowhere be separated by
a sharp demarcation line from the study of the labor itself as a
function of the individual organism. Many problems, indeed, extend in
both directions. The student of industrial efficiency is, for
instance, constantly led to the question of fatigue. He may consider
this fatigue as a function of brain and muscle activity and discuss it
with reference to the psychophysical effort, but he is equally
interested in the question of how far the apparatus or the machine or
the accessory conditions of the work might be changed in order to
avoid fatigue. The accidents of the electric street railways were
regarded as partly related to fatigue.
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